The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, April 2, 1905, Page 8

re to be sai vhen it of view?” t this: Almost from the very f the world, the wisest of men t a democracy couldn’t s great length of time. ¢y every republic had begun with 1l of them had ended with when the American G¢ shed they said that ed, They knew that n experiment, and they pointed ry to prove it, and history nod- , “Ah, hah, that’s a fact.’ came they cried out; And it seemed that off into jagged frag- ving for the hundredth republics were merely the f idle men. It seemed to be final test. But we came more cemented than ever , and the nations of the earth at us and sald: ‘Well, we'll be So, our war, the test and its the proof, finally proved to after all it is man that gov- world. Ignorance in the parts of the universe has ed with hope. The result success of democracy in Amer- ica has given to man a broader idea of God It has shown that a few men wan't anointed by the Almighty. has proved that tbe throne is a man- and not any more divine ork-bench. The Lord may have been represented a settin’ on his throne, but the one that redeemed the world stood at the work-bench. The time is comin’ when the whole earth will be Americanized. Every great book that 2 man reads helps along this idea. Yes, sir, there’s comin’ a time when a will be ashamed to live in a coun- where he's called a subject instead n. 1 wish I had a chance to y_school boy in the world. s these facts on his mind. replied old Henry, “but it me that these fellers in the L are a-tryin’ to make a monarchy this couniry as fast as they can.” “Looks that way,” Jucklin d, “but vou might jugt as say that a tricklin’ spring about to make the ocean f: the power on the face of couldn’t make a monarchy of this country. But speakin’ about bein’ a Yan , do you remember old Sam Hesbitt? Of course you do. Well, just about the time the war got well under way old Sam took it into his head that he ought to come over to my house and kill me to help things along. He had raised a souad of fel- lers ahd they wanted to make a name for themselv o one night when the moon a-shinin’ here they came. I had got wind of it and was on the lookout. I'd been mustered into the service and was stayin’ heme a few davs to straighten things out a little. And I wasn't sleeping down in the parlor. I was in the garret, I tell you; and I looked out and saw the gang a-comin’. There wasn't any chance to get away, and I lay low and waited. Pretty soon they came a-thun- derin’ at the door. My wife let 'em in They asked where I was and she id she didn’t know. She didn’t, ex- ctly—dida’t know which corner of the garret I was hidin’ in. Old Sam ‘lowed that he was glad I wasn’t in the house, for he was goin’ to set fire to it and that it would be a shame for 2 man to be burnt up in his own house. “When I heard this I sorter caught my breath, and so cold a chill ran up my back that it was all I could do to keep from sneezin’. My wife told him that the house was old and would burn easily. It had been our inten- tion to build a new one and that if he set it afire it would save the trou- ble of tearin’ it down. There was a pot of coffee on the fire. Now coffee was a scarce article and when the perfume of it began to arise, cld Sam he began to sniff. He asked her if it was Lincoln coffee, all other sort bein’ made of rye or potatoes and such like. She told him it was and Fable_s_ for the The Humorist in Business AMES HENRY was a chronic hu- morist He joked Dbecause he couldn’t help*it Now joking is like many other habits; it grows on one, and about the only way cure it the application of a abaft the ea James in its worst form. He sort of man who could have amusing in the Con- s th nd somethi. fonal Reco thought, however, a joker. tent pur- owner and high-power etter use than put it. It n to deride or belit- tie the occupat of the humorist. Even he has his uses, although it would be difficult to say at this mo- ment w they sre. Possibly he is worth having for the sake of Increas- ing other people’s satisfaction with their own dull, mediocre seriousness, if for no other reason. If we were all brilliant and sparkling, this world would be too much of a constant Fourth of July celebration for comfort. However, as we sald before, James Henry was possessed of a very useful article in the way of an Intellect. He was also the general business manager of a fair-sized income, left to his ten- der mercles by his father, whose only idea of a joke had been to catch a man bellum worthy that to which he frequently is mot our inte -on the wrongeside of the market. A very crude sense of humor, the old man had, but it served its turn. With James Henry, however, the case was very different. He had money enough to enable him to cultivate the finer arts and graces of life, or at least he thought that he had. By virtue of the fact that his father had left him in sole control of large gobs of stock and bonds and other vul- gar evidences of sordid wealth, James Henry was a member of various and sundry boards of directors, trustees, and such aggregations of power and respectability. A board of direcgors, it uld be remarked for the informa- tion of those who are not so famillar vith the involutions and convolutions of high finance as we are, is a body of men which month and votes .itself a, fee of a hundred dollars per member for said meeting. Then it goes to lunch and discourses ponder- ously on the responsibilitles of wealth and social position. That was the kind of a game that James Henry found himself up against when he emerged into the full glory of admitted manhocd and began to exer- cise the free and inalienable right of suffrage conferred upon him by the possession of several thousand dollars’ worth of common and preferred. The solemn-faced, double-chinned kings of finance who had known his father, sometimes to their sorrow, expected great things of James Henry, and to be strictly truthful, he rather antici- pated great things of himself. Poor fellow, he made the common mistake of imagining that mere brains are in demand at the present day. Brains can be hired as they are needed. What the world does need, according to the most rellable testimony, is the appearance of THE SAN FRANCISCO ' SUNDAY CALL. intelligence; any good clerk can subply the actual brains necessary to back up the appearance. But to proceed with James Henry; when he tock his seat upon the various boards of directors which his late par- ent had erstwhile adorned - with his presence he fully expected that he would soon become what is known as a power in the financfal world. This is T e 435 — T TIZAT COFFFF Was LLXED” B O the name that‘is vsually given to a man when he has reached the point where the newspapers caricature him regularly and campaign orators point to him as one of the evidences of our national decadence. James Henry ex- pected to reach this over-towering emi- nence in a few years. . When a man becomes 80 rich that all the people who haven’t any money to speak of con- sider him a national menace he can af- ford to sit down and rest. Up to that time he is only one of the common herd of millionaires. The first time James Henry got to- gether with the Napoleons of finance in the seclusion of the directors’ meet- ing the result was disillusionment all round. His jokes fell as flat as a dime novel in a Quaker prayer meeting and he told her to pour it out. So she got some cups and poured out enough for all five of them and they drank 1t and smacked their mouths. When they had put down their cups she went to the door, stepped out and with the door about a third of the way open she said: ‘If you are goin’ to burn this house down you’d better be about it. The fact is, I was ex- pectin’ you and that coffee was fixed. Didn't you notice how bitter it was? It was dosed with strychnine. And as Dr. Seymour lives at least ten miles from here you will all be dead before you can get to his house. Good night and good-by.” With that she shut the door and ran away. Well, I never heard such scufflin’ in my life. Some of them didn’t wait to get out at the door. They broke through the win- dows and one of them carried a win- dow sash for upward of a mile. I heard 'em goin’ over the hill and I laughed and took this opportunity to sneeze. “Well, they galloped all the way to the doctor’s house, threw themselves off their horses and knocked down the door in their haste to get in, and the doctor he treated them, pumped them out and charged them a horse for his services. Years afterward I met old Sam in town and I asked him if he liked coffee, and he looked at me and said: ‘Lim, you blamed fool, I'll give you the finest game rooster in the county if you won't say anything about that affair.” I told him to send over the bird and he did and I never men- tioned it again as long as he lived; but about a year afterward I heard that he had a chicken from the Spanish cock- pits of New Orleans and I wanted it. But knowin’ how much he must be at- tached to it I couldn’t think of insult- in’ him by offerin’ him money. But I went over to see him one day. He was out at the barn talkin’ to his chicken. I says to him, the finest bird I ," he says, with an air of pride, ‘he’s the finest” ‘I reckon that's so,” says L. ‘And he reminds me of one I used to own. But misfor- tune overtook him. He came into the - kitchen one day and jumped on. the table and drank some coffee and it killed him.” ‘You don’t say so?" says old Sam, with a dry grin on his face. I told him I did say so and then re- marked that I was in something of a hurry and must be goin’. ‘Don’t be pulled,’ says he. ‘Oh, by the Y. don’t you want this chicken? ‘Well, as the other one you gave me has about run out I believe I do." So I took the chicken and went home. We lost a good man when old Sam died. His judgment of a rooster was above reproach and was of great benefit to me. By the way, Henry, didn’t you shoot at me one night along in sixty- four, down here at the turn of the county road?” “Well, now, really, Lim, I don’t rec- ollect. But I was putty sociable in them days and it might have been e. “Ah, hah. I've intended a number of times fo ask you about it. It was a sort of long fire as if it hated to give up—and as you always hated to give up anything, Henry, I 'lowed it must Dbe you.” (Copyrighted, 1905, by Opie Read.) Foolish By Nicholas Nemo the general atmosphere of somnolence which pervaded the assemblage re- minded him of a Sunday morning serv ice in a deaf and dumb asylum. The director. with the longest side whiskers moved that the secretary be instruct ed to have two hundred additiona coples of the annualsreport printed James Henry was accustomed light, sparkling conversation at the luncheon table, flashes of wit anc sparks of repartee. About the only sparkles that he saw at that luncheor were in the mineral water. For theis part the other directors looked wiil heavy disapproval on a frivolou young man who could order a men with the rame careless ease whicl would go to the purchase of a news paper, and smoke a cigarette betwee: courses. They aiso disapproved of his habit of referring to the solemn func tion of daily business as a “deuced grind, don’t you know.” The directors and James Henry en- dured each other for about six month and then the latter announced his in tention of ‘withdrawing from active participation and giving his entire time to his golf score and automobile rec- ord. There was a general sizh of re- Hef that could be heard all over the financlal district at this prospect of de- liverance from the imp of frivolity and James Henry's place was filled by a melancholy dyspeptic whose mind was as empty of real, original {deas as his face was solemn and impressive James Henry draws his quarterly dividends and inwardly digests the im- portant Iesson that while a merry heart may do good like a medicine, a great many people are opposed to medicine, especially during business hours.—Copyright, 1904, by Alb. Britt.